Quick, what color are your eyes? You may have answered blue or hazel or brown, but if you were Japanese, you’d likely have replied, “black.” Like all East Asians, Japanese are all born with brown eyes, but for incomprehensible cultural reasons they’ll always tell you that their eyes are “black” if asked because they think you’re asking about the pupil and not the iris. Eye color is something the Japanese are quite fascinated with when it comes to gaijin, and I’ve had many students who wanted to talk about my eyes, ask what color my parents’ eyes were or see if I perceived the world through a blue tint. I personally have hazel-blue eyes that change color depending on what I’m wearing, and whenever I told my Japanese students this they were shocked and refused to believe me. Maybe the “black” eyes of Japanese people explains why they use the word 青 ao meaning blue to describe a “green” traffic light. I’ll have to ponder that one a bit…
The twins with blue yes, from Please Twins.
